Resale Truck Prices Up Slightly in August

Sept. 25, 2013
Resale and auction truck prices increased 0.2% in August compared to July.

Resale and auction truck prices increased 0.2% in August compared to July, according to The Truck Blue Book.

Medium-duty trucks experienced greater price depreciation than heavy-duty trucks. Positive indicators such as rising housing starts, stock prices, and GDP coupled with declining unemployment signal a brighter economic future.

Focusing on commercial trucks model years 2004‐2013 in the U.S. with less than one million miles, the average auction prices increased for both categories of trucks. Average resale prices increased for heavy duty, but decreased for medium. Overall volume decreased in both auction and resale for both size classes.

As expected, auction prices are lower than the current resale prices and trucks on the resale market are holding value better than in auction. The 2012 model year heavy- and medium-duty commercial trucks are holding at 80.9% of the MSRP in resale, but only 49.8% in auction so far in the third quarter, which reflects the paucity of new equipment in a good condition available at auction. The 2012 model year trucks currently have the highest value in resale and 2010s have the highest in auction (72.4% of MSRP in Q3).

The Southeast saw the highest overall and heavy-duty pricing increase while medium-duty prices decreased at the national average. The West experienced the greatest overall monthly price decrease at 0.8%. This decline is smaller than the West saw in July, but the region still has the second-highest average resale price. The decrease in the West stabilized prices after July’s 7.8% increase. The highest average price is in the Southwest, where prices are 10% and 18% higher than national averages in the medium- and heavy-duty markets, respectively. The Southwest and Northeast did not see any significant changes. The Southwest saw the largest decline in volume among the five regions with most of the decrease in medium duty trucks (Classes 5 and 6), the remaining trucks were larger (classes 7 and 8) causing average resale prices to rise. The Northeast had a reduction in volume of 2.7% and the largest decrease was for size class 5 trucks.

Model Years 2007 and 2012 demonstrated the greatest price decrease. As expected with the 2014 model year trucks entering the market, the 2013 model year trucks prices dropped the greatest degree month-to‐month (4.8%).

The heavy-duty market increased 0.8% in August. With auction volume down, the market was driven by resale prices. The largest increase was for the 2004 model year heavy truck at 0.7% and the largest decrease was the 2011 model year at 4.9%.

For heavy-duty commercial trucks on the market during August, 39% are non‐sleepers (down from 42% in July). Of the non‐sleepers, model years 2005‐2007 are the most common to see on the market (accounting for 77% of the non‐sleeper tractors for sale in August). On the sleeper market, model years 2006‐2010 are the most popular to be sold accounting for 81% of the sleepers.

The top 5 heavy-duty truck manufacturers for August are: Freightliner, International, Kenworth, Peterbilt, and Volvo. Among these, Kenworth has the current highest resale prices.

The medium-duty resale market has fallen by 2.8% between July and August. There were no increases for medium-duty model year average resale prices in August, but the largest decrease was for the 2011 MY.